Air vehicle control is achieved through modifying flow across control surfaces, typically by adjusting flaps and angle of attack. Flow along the control surfaces can be modified in other ways to allow external control of the air vehicle. This can be achieved by generating excitations to seed instabilities that lead to transitions in the flow along the control surface, (such as boundary layer separation leading to decreased lift, stall, etc). Several publications discuss this (see below for a few), and one general term used to describe the phenomenon is “receptivity” of the specific driving frequency being picked up and amplified as it propagates along the control surface.
Abbott, Ira H.; Von Doenhoff, Albert E.; and Stivers, Louis S., Jr.: Summary of Airfoil Data. NACA Rep. 824 (1945).
Lachowicz, J. M., Yao, C. S., and Wlezien, Richard W.: Flow field characterization of a jet and vortex actuator, Experiments in Fluids, Volume 27,Issue 1,pp. 12-20 (1999).
Schewe, G., Reynolds-number effects in flow around more-or-less bluff bodies, Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics 89, 1267-1289 (2001).
Smetana, Frederick O.; Summey, Delbert C.; Smith, Neill S.; and Carden, Ronald K.: Light Aircraft Lift, Drag, and Moment Prediction—A Review and Analysis. NASA CR-2523 (1975).
Wlezien, Richard W. and Ferraro, P. J.: Aeroacoustic Environment of an Advanced STOVL Aircraft in Hover, AIAA J. Vol. 30 (11), pp. 2606-2612 (1992).
Wlezien, Richard W., Parekh, D. E., and Island, T.: Measurement of Acoustic Receptivity at Leading Edges and Porous Strips, Applied Mechanics Reviews, Vol. 43, 5,Part 2,pp. S167-S174 (1990).
The basic concept is that certain frequency excitations grow exponentially when seeded at the leading edge of a control surface, other frequencies die down and lead to stable flow. Seeding these frequencies, even very lightly, can lead to dramatic modification to the flow across the control surface, in particular, in loss of laminar flow, replaced by separated flow, leading to a strong reduction in lift, in fact leading to stall under the right conditions (or a dramatic loss in lift). The excitations we will provide are mediated/delivered via laser and much of the pertinent background is described in great detail in the Kremeyer patents included by reference. The laser-induced shockwaves we introduce, either on or near a surface, seed an extremely broad frequency range, encompassing the unstable (growing) frequencies, as well as stable (non-growing) frequencies. Even a very weak one-time introduction of an unstable frequency is expected to grow, as a result, introduction of the broad spectrum by the shockwaves at the leading edge is expected to seed all of the growing modes to disrupt flow. Performing this repeatedly/repetitively will ensure significant and lasting flow disruption on the targeted control surface.